As I explore Act II, Iím still bewildered as to how they could have taken so long to make a game that adds so little. The engine is pretty enough, lavishly detailed, it does the job, but remains extremely dated in concept Ė thereís no analogue zoom (you can uselessly zoom right in on your character, which is great for screenshots and not a lot else), you canít rotate the camera, you canít interact with the world while the mapís on screen, the inventory covers up the map, and the tool-tips for loot seem completely arbitrary as to whether theyíll show up or not. No, rotating cameras arenít necessary. But itís important to keep in mind how relatively primitive the game is, when then taking into account its failings.
And they all come in the form of the always-on DRM. Yes, people are sick of the topic. But that doesnít make it something that can be ignored. It was because the connection dropped in the solo game Iím playing that all those events in the first paragraph took place. Eventually, about fifteen minutes later, it admitted the connection was gone, and restarting yet again put me back at the last checkpoint, one dungeon and an entire map ago. And nothing Ė absolutely nothing Ė interesting lies between me and where Iíve reached twice before.

But Diablo III instead pushes every character down the same rail, both geographically (this is an oppressively narrow world compared to Diablo II) and in terms of character development for each of the classes. A witch doctor, barbarian, demon hunter, monk, or wizard of any given level will have the exact same skills and attributes as any other witch doctor, barbarian, demon hunter, monk, or wizard of that level. Which seems like a terrible idea to those of us who sulked and booted up Diablo II for a while.
But in Diablo III you will start to get it after about ten levels. You will wallow in it gleefully after about twenty levels. You might roll up your sleeves and start poring over wikis after thirty levels. I expect weíll be arguing about it online after forty levels, discovering new options after fifty levels, and unable to let go even after hitting level 60. The simple fact of the matter is that Blizzard was right to unfurl class skills in a set order and to instead give us the option of equipping any six at a time (hello, Guild Wars!). And to furthermore let us modify each of those skills with runes to tweak how they work, and then passive skills to further tweak how they work. Diablo III is built for people who want to tinker rather than people who want to just cop out and decide. Tinkering can be every bit as effective a hook as deciding.

I am far past the age to get overwrought about these things, but I find that with Diablo 3 the production values are as one would expect very high, but to me there is something definitely missing. I would have to say that a true skill tree and meaningful character customization would definitely have improved this for me immensely. While I understand Blizzards increasing move towards the belief customization is a hangup and limits ones ability to take different approaches and understand that I may be a dinosaur, I feel much less invested in the game.

Regardless, of how ultimately meaningless and/or limiting a skill tree may be, I feel like I am not really playing for anything more than loot and that is not really enough for me. I could even, although somewhat regretfully, argue that dungeon siege iii scratched the original diablo itch for me than this one. Once again, I acknowledge that i am a dinosaur and that skill selections may be more of an appearance of choice than actual choice, but I feel something is missing herel.

What is missing is the fact that due to allowing you to use any skills you want at any time by simply changing them, you never have any need or desire to play the same class more than once (or once in normal and once in hardcore).

Definitely doesn't deserve a 9/10; a 7 or 8 perhaps. It's really hard to believe they took all this time with development - there's practically no innovation and, in some cases, even regression when compared to its predecessor.

In addition to what the reviewer criticized, I find the inability to travel between acts without losing quest progression cumbersome and annoying. And the controls are maddeningly imprecise for a melee character - I constantly lose focus of my target and find myself walking past and/or around enemies.

Whatever. I really regret my purchase, especially for $65. I should have beat down the nagging voice in the back of my mind with a 10lb hammer rather than succumb to curiosity.

The game has good mechanics and looks very good. The only issue I take with is the story which is just weak. Weak when compared to Diablo 2. It's full of plot-holes and exagerations.

Spoiler

I mean they actually want us to believe that everything that happened for the last hundreds of years, the events of Diablo 1, Diablo 2, etc, were the plans of Diablo. They actually want us to believe Diablo planned for the other evils to rebel, banish them to Sanctuary, get caught by the Horadrim, get imprison in soulstones, break free, get their soulstones destroyed and then have them all get absorbed into one black soulstone, which Diablo could then use to become the single Prime Evil.

How stupid is that? Very stupid. They couldn't come up with a decent story and they had 7 years to do it. The gameplay is very good and addicting as hell. But I just can't find the motivation of clearing levels when the story is that weak, and pvp hasn't been added yet. I'll probably get back into D3 after pvp launches.

I mean they actually want us to believe that everything that happened for the last hundreds of years, the events of Diablo 1, Diablo 2, etc, were the plans of Diablo. They actually want us to believe Diablo planned for the other evils to rebel, banish them to Sanctuary, get caught by the Horadrim, get imprison in soulstones, break free, get their soulstones destroyed and then have them all get absorbed into one black soulstone, which Diablo could then use to become the single Prime Evil.

How stupid is that? Very stupid. They couldn't come up with a decent story and they had 7 years to do it.

IÖ what? I'd heard the story was stupid but dang. That really takes the cake.

Too bad, I really liked the Diablo world and hadn't gotten far enough in D3 to see that much of the plot.

DArtagnan

Originally Posted by zz
What is missing is the fact that due to allowing you to use any skills you want at any time by simply changing them, you never have any need or desire to play the same class more than once (or once in normal and once in hardcore).

This hurts replay value and how long the game will last for you.

This is true. You now 'only' have 5 play throughs for the different character classes (counting running through the difficulty levels as a single play). For a £20 game that's very generous.

I learned my lesson with the hypes lately (Witcher2 and co) so went on hold for this game. Scores like 9/10 etc I don't believe anymore. When you play games like me for 30 years you know you can be happy to see 1 real 9/10 per year.

Yes they took long to make this game. Only reason I can see, they had no interest/motivation/inspiration/need money for this game and just went slowly on it, hyping it by using their good reputation for the next generation. I will buy it one day and yes I know its a dumb hack/slash game but Diablo II was also like that.
The real trouble I have is that you need be online. For that reason alone I wait for a 'solution' before I get it, they think their costumers are idiots willing to accept anything by doing this and unfortunately there are a lot of those out there.

I still play a fully modded Oblivion, a 5 year old game that beats most new games at ease. Wonder if I could still play this game if I had to be on-line.

Originally Posted by dagoo7
I would have to say that a true skill tree and meaningful character customization would definitely have improved this for me immensely. While I understand Blizzards increasing move towards the belief customization is a hangup and limits ones ability to take different approaches and understand that I may be a dinosaur, I feel much less invested in the game.

You know, ordinarily I'd agree with you but I've really enjoyed D3's approach. I'd never accept it in a "real" RPG but, given these are action games, I find the opportunity to play with different setups quite enjoyable. I'm not convinced it really affects replayability (not that I find time to replay games) because there are still a large number of skill and rune combinations - while you might experiment with a number of combinations during one playthrough it's different playing a large portion of the game with a different skill/rune combination.

Originally Posted by Skybird
For that reason alone I wait for a 'solution' before I get it, they think their costumers are idiots willing to accept anything by doing this and unfortunately there are a lot of those out there.

Look, disagree with the online setup to your heart's content but do me a favour and don't call me an idiot in the process. People have different expectations and that doesn't automatically make them idiots.

Just finished Diablo III (Normal playthrough) and thought it was mind-numblingly tedious despite the relatively short length of the campaign, great production values and a very good implementation of core gameplay mechanics. The pure traditional ARPG just doesn't cut it in 2012; at least not as a $60 product with draconian DRM.

I agree, though, that the skill system hurts longevity - but the way they've implemented Inferno mode and how the AH works means there are other reasons to keep playing for a very long time.

But, even though I disagree with Blizzard about some things, I have to say they've executed what they set out to do - perfectly.

I've played this 60 hours almost non-stop since I got it, and that means it triggered something that only happens to me every 5 years or so.

And what did you think about the plot? How would you rate that?

I agree that the mechanics and gameplay are great. I regularly find myself clearing maps/dungeons of monsters without even knowing what the hell I started questing for in the first place. In that sense it's very nicely done. But I would have loved for them to put at least 1/10 of the effort they put into everything else, into the storyline and plot. At least for it to be half as decent as it was in Diablo 2.

Originally Posted by danutz_plusplus
And what did you think about the plot? How would you rate that?

Much much better than previous Diablos. Each area has a vaguely coherent rationale and the backstory is explained at each stage. The quality of the story isn't anything special - OK, it's pretty bad actually - but there is at least lore for most things if you seek out the journals. Or you can just ignore them and bash through - the choice is yours.